In the newest Ask Riot article, Riot Games answered a few pressing questions that have been on League of Legends players’ minds, including when the next ultimate skin will be released, why there have been so many Akali nerfs, and why some bugs remain untouched on live servers for so long.
First, Riot said that although the team does want to make another ultimate skin, it might not happen this year. The team did have a few ideas that seemed good, but none of them were good enough to “go all-in” on.
“We want to make sure the next one we commit to really exceeds your expectations, and this takes more than just an innovative idea—it takes extra dev time to get there,” Riot said. “It’s important to us that the next ultimate skin we make for one champion feels more worthwhile than if we were to have spent that time creating Legendary skins for multiple champions.”
For Akali mains who are tired of their champion getting nerfed, Riot also had an explanation for that. Akali is a champion whose effectiveness is much greater for pros compared to regular players, which makes her a really challenging character to balance. The team needs to figure out how to nerf her pro play ability while simultaneously buffing her solo queue ability, all without removing some of the more fun components of her kit.
“Managing champion performance disparities—both by resolving the issues quickly and by better anticipating them—is something we’re actively trying to get better at,” Lead designer David “Repertoir” Capurro said.
Lastly, Riot talked about why some bugs and glitches stay on live servers for so long—the basic answer is that Riot has to prioritize their time correctly and if a bug doesn’t happen too often or isn’t affecting the game too much, they will put that issue to the side. The question the team poses themselves is, “Would a developer’s time be better spent working on something else right now, whether that be new content, other bugs, or another thing entirely?”
